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The purpose of the study was to develop and test culturally appropriate health promotion materials that were seen to be socially inclusive in regard to blood donation within the Australian-African community. Materials were produced in multiple languages (English, Arabic, Swahili and Kirundi) and were initially developed based on previous pilot data, with feedback from the project partner (Australian Red Cross Blood Service) and the African community. Seven formative focus groups with 62 participants were then conducted to ensure the materials would be effective, credible and culturally acceptable to the target audience, including preferred messages, taglines and images. The response confirmed that quotes and images from community members (as opposed to actors) were critical to ensure messages were engaging and believable, and had meaningful taglines that were perceived to be authentic. The refined materials were then used in a community intervention study. The evaluation included an assessment of respondents' views of the messages post-intervention. Of the 281 African migrants who saw the campaign materials during the intervention period, the majority (75.8%) strongly agreed that the materials made them feel part of the wider Australian community. These results suggest that engagement in developmental activities with targeted communities is important for creating positively viewed culturally targeted public health campaigns. A six-step process is suggested that could be used by other organizations to ensure that messages are acceptable to targeted migrant communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on a study which examined the motivations of research participants in joining a voluntary online panel. Motivations for volunteering under the Volunteer Functions Inventory (VFI) include values, social, career, understanding, enhancement and protective. There are 30 items included in the VFI, which has been used in a variety of volunteering situations. A web-based, self-reported survey data from a sample of members belonging to an Australian online panel was used in this study. Results of the study showed a lack of statistical significance in the relationship between the latent variables Protective and Value Expressiveness. It also found that the first-order structure of the VFI has a stronger solution than second-order models.